


Louis and Philippe in the Garden

by Seonaid



Category: Versailles (TV 2015)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-15
Updated: 2016-06-15
Packaged: 2018-07-15 04:44:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7208222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seonaid/pseuds/Seonaid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is my version of a (probably) deleted scene.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Louis and Philippe in the Garden

Philippe ran across the candle lit lawn as the sounds of canon and black powder exploded in his head. Beneath his feet were blood curdled mud and manure, not smooth clean grass. The scent in his nostrils was not floral water and night blooming flowers but gunpowder and gore. The shrieks of dying men echoed in his mind as he dropped sobbing to his knees, shivering in despair. In that moment, he was back on the war field, sitting in the blood holding his dead horse's head, looking at the bodies strewn around him. The hand on his back made him jump with sudden dread as he groped for a pistol that was not there.

“Hush, brother, hush, it is just me,” Louis' gentle voice pushed through Philippe's terror and brought him back to the lush gardens of Versailles under a moonlit sky. At once, another firework cracked and lit up the sprawling vista of the grounds before them, sparks of burning paper slowly descending as the dark returned. Philippe shivered again and clung to Louis, “Make it stop”, he whispered against his brother's shoulder. “Please, please make it stop.”

“I think that was the last of it. It can't hurt you, dear Philippe. It is just noise and light. The war is over.” Louis gently stroked his brother's hair.

“It will never be over, at least for me.” Philippe pulled back and sat, knees up, curling his arms around his legs, rocking slowly back and forth. “You.. you did this to me. To all of them, sent them to their deaths, made me a witness to it.” Philippe's face was smeared with tears, snot, and spit. He glared at Louis with sudden contempt. “You, it was you that sent them all to war, to fight for you, but you stay in the palaces, the drawing rooms or in the lavish tents. You, and your assembly of nobles. You don't see what we see. You don't feel the fear, the pain, the dread. You don't stand watching the advancing line of men, arms aimed, swords held high, as the piss runs down your leg. They rush towards you, horses snorting in terror, canons firing as the mud flares up in black showers, body parts flying spraying blood.. the screams of men crying for their mothers.”

A fresh stream of hot tears ran down Philippe's face as his eyes reflected his words. His beautiful eyes. Louis looked at his brother's face. Such exquisiteness. Porcelain skin, shiny, thick dark hair, tangled now from his dash across the grounds. His eyes in the sunlight were the colour of ice, round and large, thickly fringed in dark lashes. Here, in the moonlight, they were an indefinable colour, glittering with tears and sorrow. His lips, dark pink pillows, against white nearly perfect teeth. Undamaged in the war, thought Louis thankfully, his features so very similar to Louis' own green eyed face. Only his brother's mind bore any signs of the after effects of battle. Louis gently pulled the strands of hair away from Philippe's mouth and held the back of his neck softly but firmly.

“My dear sweet brother. I did not send you to war for me. I sent you for France. I sent you for the peasants in their mud and stone huts, toiling with their bare hands. I sent you for the merchants eking out a meager living selling their wares on the streets, the docks, the villages. I sent you for the farmers working the land from sun up to sun down every single day. I sent you for the nobles whose lands are ancient and whose families go back a thousand years. I sent you for the church, the priests and nuns with heads bowed in prayer until their dying day. I sent you for the very soil we sit upon, the glorious fleurs-de-lis, our symbol of centuries of those who worked, those who fought, those who prayed. You fought for the House of Bourbon, the House of Orléans. You are the glory, the sword, the might. You are my beloved companion since our births, and until our deaths.”

Louis' hands held onto both sides of Philippe's head during his passionate speech. The tears welled up in his eyes and as he fell silent, he lowered his forehead to Philippe's. “I love you so, my dear brother. There is no other more precious to me. You must know that the sacrifice you gave to France is inestimable and cherished.”

Philippe's face calmed and he looked up at the stars for a moment. “And, I love you as well, my brother, my king. I just cannot stop hearing the battle,” he said softly. He rose on shaky legs and together, arm in arm, they walked slowly back to the brightly lit pavilion full of revelers and guests of the chateau.

 

**Author's Note:**

> This is unbetaed work. Mistakes are my own.


End file.
